Voice of the people (letter).

Utter Madness

February 25, 1998|By A. Gharibian.

HARWOOD HEIGHTS — Your Feb. 17 editorial on Armenia was too much to be believed!

On one hand, you indicate Levon Ter-Petrosian "was a deeply flawed figure widely believed to have stolen the last election." Yet in the very same sentence, you have the audacity to laud him for his statesmanship in supporting a peace plan for Nagorno-Karabakh.

Doesn't anyone read history anymore? Why would an enclave in Azerbaijan be inhabited by Armenians? Why would the area hold such a strong Christian identity? What about those ancient Armenian churches that have endured centuries of persecution by non-Christian wolves? Let me give you a historical hint: Look up Joseph Stalin. Why don't you read your own articles about Stalin and the inhumanity he launched upon innocent people as he redesigned the atlas?

Nagorno-Karabakh is Armenian. When something belongs to you, you cannot compromise its ownership. If you do, you have sold your country and your God for 40 pieces of silver.

Now the Tribune suggests lifting the ban on Azerbaijan. And the trickle-down theory from oil sales is as old as President Bush's "Thousand Points of Light" speech. You can do better than that. Use the Turkish government's marketing tactics--expensive, but effective. Armenia has never flirted with madness. But she has been raped by it many times.

The 1915 genocide that sent 1.5 million men, women and children to their death has not been forgotten. The Armenian cause still demands justice. Ethnic cleansing and man's inhumanity to man will not be overlooked no matter how profitable it may be in oil sales.

Armenians believe in justice. It is the only thing that has kept them from disappearing from the face of the Earth. The obvious ignorance of facts evidenced by your editorial is shocking. Don't embarrass yourself so badly again. That's more than flirting with madness; that's actually marrying it.